Five Carbs to Build Easy Meals Around

Having trusty carbs is a practical route to calmer, tastier weeknights. It's a go to method for me when I'm in need of inspiration - start with one dependable carbohydrate, then build the rest of dinner around it. 

I talk about carbohydrates as energy and why you need both short and long lasting carbs in your week. I walk you through five “anchor carbs” I come back to again and again for family dinners: potatoes, bread, pasta, rice and beans. You’ll get loads of practical weekly meal ideas, from flexible jacket potatoes and dinner bagels to pasta that feeds you on hard days.

I'll be sharing a listener’s very relatable weekly pattern and why spotting and accepting patterns in the way you cook can be more useful than chasing a perfect plan.

You’ll also pick up confidence-boosting kitchen skills: the pasta-water trick that makes even a basic sauce taste glossy and restaurant-level, plus a fool-proof basmati rice method that stops rice feeling stressful. We finish with beans as a cheap, nutritious powerhouse, including chickpeas, kidney beans and black beans, and a simple prompt to create your own carb list for quick inspiration.

If you found this helpful, hit subscribe, share the podcast with a fellow home cook, and leave a review so more people can find Cook and Nourish. What carb are you building dinner around this week?

Transcript

Welcome And Meal Planning Wins

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Hello, lovely cooks, and welcome back to Cook and Nourish. This is the podcast celebrating and supporting brilliant home cooks like you. I'm your host, Claire Serene, and I have cooked in Michelin-starred restaurants, but the thing I'm still most proud of is being a home cook because it's everyday hard work that's appreciated by people I love. Today we're going to talk about five carbs that you can build your weekly meals around. I find it way easier to think of what's for dinner when I start with a protein or a carbohydrate, and these five carbs offer infinite possibilities. But first, I am delighted that my meal planning tips were helpful. I had lovely emails and messages from people. Some who had never meal planned but felt inspired to give it a go, and then other people who do meal plan but got some extra ideas and tips from my system. Anik in Edinburgh looked back at her meals to find her recurring themes, and then she sent them to me, and they made me laugh rather a lot. Anik's meals are Monday, pasta, Tuesday, damn, I forgot to take the meat out of the freezer again, so let's get a takeaway. Wednesday, pasta again because I made too much on Monday. Thursday. We're driving past my mother-in-law's house and she's probably got leftovers because she still cooks like she's feeding a scout troop. Friday. Tacos because everyone's delighted that it's Friday and we all love tacos. I think that sounds like a pretty great week, Anik. She was kind enough to say that recognizing the pattern of how she actually cooks did make her feel better. She can anticipate that Wednesday is leftovers, and that's okay. It's not a compromise. And that is what this podcast is all about: shifting your expectations rather than your cooking. Back

Why Carbs Make Dinner Easier

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to today, and it's all about carbs. Carbohydrates are a huge family of ingredients that give you body energy. Some carbs burn quickly, which means you feel full and energized for a short period of time, and others burn slowly so that you can feel full and energized for longer. Both serve a purpose. I like molding meals around five different carbs for a few reasons. Firstly, it means we instantly get some variety in our weekday meals. Some carbs are always on hand because they're staples that sit in my cupboard for weeks, so I don't have to go shopping for them. And lastly, because carbs are a great source of energy and it's an essential component of any meal. So starting with a carb ticks that off your list. Carbs have had a bad press in the last decade as the popularity of keto diets saw people lose weights. Carbohydrates became synonymous with weight rather than energy. But as with all things, balance and variety are key. Carbs appear naturally in vegetables, beans, nuts, foods that have enormous benefits to your health. So carbs are not a one size fits all. And understanding that your body needs long burning carbs every day and short burning carbs if you're using a lot of energy in a short period of time helps you choose the right carbs for you. You might be stuck in a carb rut, so hopefully today you will find some ideas to try some new staples or branch out with a trusty carb friend, but trying some new ingredients along with it. In my house, the carbs I build my meals around are potatoes, bread, rice, pasta, and beans. These five friends show up time and time again in my recipes. So I'm not sure what to make. I can go to these five groups for a solid starting point. And what I love about these five groups of carbs is that there are loads of variations within them. So let's

Potatoes From Comfort To Fuel

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start with spuds. At the fast energy, comforting end are chips, mash, nocchi, and roasties. Then at the longer lasting energy end, you've got sweet potatoes, jacket spuds, and new potatoes. That's a lot of choice in one carb group. General rule of thumb is that skins and colours are good. So a baked sweet potato is just the best carb going for long-lasting energy with loads of extra vitamins. That rule goes out of the window when you make fantastic loaded jacket potato skins with bacon, chives, and cheese and eat them in your pajamas on a Friday. Not that I'm saying that's something I would do regularly at all. But as I said in episode three, I am not apologizing for delicious, and some things just need to be eaten on certain days. Jacket potatoes make a regular appearance on my dinner table because they provide a great energy and nutrition base that can have infinite varieties on top. They're kid friendly, they're very flexible on how long they can stay in the oven. So basically they're just a perfect weekday meal starting point. I often do potatoes twice in a week, but I do try to choose one from the fast energy end and one from the slow energy end so that I can spread the nutrition out over the week. Like I said before, nutrition sits like puzzle pieces over a whole week. Individual meals don't have to bear the entire load. This

Bread As A Proper Dinner Base

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spectrum of energy also exists in bread, and bread is a much overlooked carb for dinner. We sort of have it synonymous with lunch, but chuck it into your dinner rotation and it changes things. At the fast energy end, we've got bagels, hot dog buns, baguettes, and gnar bread. In the middle, you've got pizza bread and flour tortillas. Then at the long-lasting energy end as whole meals, seeded breads, and rye breads. The meal possibilities are huge. Everything from hot dogs to homemade veggie soup with seeded bread, which I will admit I then do cover in a doorstop's worth of butter, but you know, give and take. Bagels for dinner are a go-to on my easy meal list because everyone in my family likes them. It's easy to add lots of nutrition to the top, so they're a win. You can also jam loads of veggies, pickles, and proteins into a flour tortilla, and so the balance for that on a weekday meal is terrific. The heavier breads are phenomenal at breakfast to sustain you through the day. But fresh breads don't last as long if you don't eat the whole thing straight away. I buy a large loaf and then I cut it in half and I freeze one portion, then use the other half that day for whatever I want, and then the next day there's enough for me to toast the slices and then dip them into fantastic bunny eggs, which by the way is a phenomenal dinner. And then I've got the other half to defrost and repeat the process. It makes my money and nutrition go further.

Pasta Favourites And Pasta Water

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Pasta is an unshakable pillar of weekday meals in the UK. Did you know that 50% of us eat pasta every week without fail, and with very good reason? It's delicious, it's easy, and it's versatile. There are really only a couple of types of pasta when you break it down. White made with refined white flour, and brown made with wholemeal flour. White pasta is at the shorter energy carb than brown pasta, but nowhere near as short energy as, say, a burger bun, for example. So white pasta is nothing to panic about. I could write a sonnet on my deep love and appreciation for pasta, because it has helped me feed my family on the hardest of days. My go-to pasta dishes are spaghetti putinesca because it uses tin tomatoes, tinned anchovies, and jarred capers, all things that I have on standby in my cupboards. Packaged tortellini and chicken stock is another favourite because it's like a giant soup and it's ready in less than 15 minutes. And finally, its carbonara is the queen of sauces for a reason. It is my absolute favourite. My kids think it's called bacon and egg pasta, but yeah, they're heathens, so what can you do? Pasta also translates beautifully into warmer weather, when a pasta salad can become dinner eaten on the patio with a glass of something lovely. While we're on the subject of pasta, I have to share with you the one chefy tip that I wish everybody knew. It is pasta water. Do not throw your pasta water away, because that cloudy, salty water is full of starch, and it's the secret to making even the simplest jar of sauce become something spectacular. Just before you drain the pasta, scoop out a mug of water, add your pasta to the sauce, then gradually splash in that starchy water a little at a time. You don't want your sauce too loose. Give it a vigorous toss because it's that action that emulsifies the sauce, which means the sauce then clings to the pasta instead of sitting in a puddle at the bottom of the bowl. It is a 10-second move that makes you feel like a pro and it costs absolutely nothing and is one of my favourite quiet kitchen skills to make dinner taste better. I rarely make brown pasta, and that's purely a time thing. I know that the brown stuff will be better for me, and maybe one day I'll make more of a conscious switch, but right now I don't worry about it.

Rice Types And A No-Peek Method

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Rice is my next reliable carb, and it breaks down into three groups. At the fast energy end, we've got white rice, but this breaks down even further actually into starchy and long grain rices. Starchy rice is used in things like risotto that make that wonderful creamy texture. And then long grains like basmati and jasmine provide the same level of carb but with a lower rate of conversion to sugar. At the long-lasting energy end are brown, black, wild, and red rices. These all have their husks still attached, which means it takes longer to break down in your body and they take longer to cook, but it's so worth taking the time because they are super tasty. I rely heavily on white rice in the week because I know exactly how long it takes to cook enough rice for four of us. But at the weekend, when I have more time, I love cooking darker rices because they have nutty and earthy flavors that are really special. I know a lot of people stress about cooking rice and would rather use a microwave pouch. I have those on standby for times when I just need a quick solution. But I have a 20-minute method for basmasi rice that has just served me so well for weekday dinners. It's the one to two ratio where you use one cup of rice to two cups of cold water. If you wash the rice first, it will be fluffier, but it's not essential. Put the rice, water, and a little pinch of salt into a small pan that has a tight fitting lid and bring it all to the boil. As soon as that thing is boiling, immediately turn the heat down as low as it will go, then put the tight-fitting lid on the top and walk away. Do not peek, do not stir, do not stare at it, just walk away. And after 10 to 12 minutes, the water will have gone and you can turn off the heat, but keep the lid on for another five minutes. In that five minutes, the steam works magic and makes it all fluffy. When you take the lid off and fluff it with a fork, you will feel like a kitchen wizard because mastering the basmati boil is a massive confidence booster and it makes those long grain carbs feel like an easy, reliable friend rather than a stressful foe. My go-to rice dishes in the week are pan-fried salmon with veggies and rice, one of my kids' favorites. And then I do a tomato chicken thing with rice, veggie stir fry is a massive favourite, and then Mongolian beef, which I've talked about on my socials and I've had lovely people's feedback on how much they've enjoyed it. Rice turns up in lots of my leftover menus because it's a great way to use up leftover roasted meats from my Sunday lunches. My

Beans For Cheap Slow Energy

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fifth and final go-to carbohydrate is beans. And I know this can be trickier for some people to weave into their weekday meals, but it is worth persevering because beans are an incredibly easy, cheap, nutritious, and versatile carb to get into your rotation. They're becoming more accessible thanks to tinned and jarred beans that take all of the effort out of soaking them before you can cook them. And that's what's been a game changer, really, from taking beans to a think ahead kind of ingredient to ready in a flash solution. Tins of beans are relatively cheap and they can sit in the cupboard for ages, which is always a godsend for the home cook. Beans are so beneficial because not only do you get the slow burning energy goodness, but you also get protein, fibre, and micronutrients that stabilize your blood sugar. That's not a bad bang for your buck, is it? Beans really don't have a short and long division because they're just all hell bent on doing you good. Even the humble tin of baked beans delivers protein, fibre, and slow burning carbs. If you buy the reduced sugar and salt kind, then it's even more beneficial. Here are the beans I find easiest to weave into my weekday meals. First up is chickpeas, because they are so flipping useful. You can fry them for sort of a crispy texture, you can chuck them into a stew for extra body, or you can puree them with oil and flavourings for a fantastic, delicious sauce. So what's not to love? I often eat chickpeas for breakfast with eggs, not least because they love spice, so I can add chilies. The liquid that tinned chickpeas are packed in is called aquafaba, and it can be used as an egg white substitute in sweet and savory cooking. And if you want to know more about that, you have to check out my lovely fellow MasterChef runner-up, Sophie Suggru's Instagram, because she knows what she's doing when it comes to all thing beans and aquafaba. Kidney beans are a powerhouse and a classic in chili, so just adding a tin to a dark red veggie or meat sauce will up your protein, fibre, and good energy. They're heavy enough that you can smush them up together with some flavourings and make fantastic veggie burgers, and they're also just brilliant loaded onto a jacket spud with tons of melty cheese. I use black beans a lot because they're fantastic with scrambled eggs and salsa at breakfast. They're dead easy to add to tacos, and then they add really lovely texture to things like my Mexican chowder soup. They add protein, fibre, and tons of micronutrients in one move.

Build Your Carb List And Close

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Similar to my meal planning system, I keep a list of my favourite carbs on hand when I'm in need of inspiration. So tonight, jot down some of the carbs that you and your diners like to eat. Not whole recipes, just the carbs that keep you going. These are the building blocks of your weekday meals and a great starting place to grow your repertoire. You can use something familiar whilst branching out into new flavours or an ingredients, and it's a wonderful starting place to grow confidence. One of the great joys of eating is variety, and carbs are the king of variety. You can eat delicious, deeply nourishing, slow-burning carbs that support your long-term well-being, and you can eat fat-loaded carbs with your favourite people and get a rush of endorphins that comfort you. They are not nutritionally equal, but they don't have to be. Whether you're eating chips or wild rice for dinner, take a moment to appreciate the brilliant carbs on your plate that gave you the energy to be the hardworking, brilliant home cook that you are. If you're enjoying the podcast, then I would be overjoyed if you can hit subscribe. This free and simple click will help people find the home cook support we share here, and it would mean the world to me. I really appreciate you being here. Thank you for spending time with me at Cook and Nourish. I hope you love your carbs this week. So until next time, happy cooking!